Fatal Luck
By
Dorothy Howell
Copyright © 2014 by Dorothy Howell
DorothyHowellNovels.com
These stories are works of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from Dorothy Howell.
Cover art by Evie Cook
http://evie-cook.artistwebsites.com
Editing by William F. Wu
www.williamfwu.com
DEDICATION:
To all my loved ones for their endless support
ACKNOWLEDGMENT:
I couldn’t have written this novella without the help of many people. Some of them are: Judith Branstetter, Stacy Howell, Evie Cook,
the gifted folks at Webcrafters Design, and William F. Wu, Ph.D.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Excerpt from Beach Bags and Burglaries
Excerpt from The Widow's Little Secret
Chapter 1
Sometimes you get lucky.
I’m not talking about sex—although that topic came up often. No, I’m talking about actual luck, good luck—kismet, serendipity, the fortuitous alignment of the planets. Thankfully, my mojo was working pretty well because it kept me from witnessing a murder.
Not bad for a Monday morning.
I’m Dana Mackenzie. I worked for Mid-America Financial Services, a nationwide consumer finance company that granted personal loans, home equity mortgages, and some dealer financing for things like TVs, stereos, and furniture.
Mid-America made loans to just about anybody for just about anything. The tricky part wasn’t lending out the money, of course, it was collecting it back. That’s where I came in.
A lot of people thought this was not a good way for a 27-year-old single female to spend her days. Sometimes, I agreed.
Mid-America had about a thousand branch offices nationwide, one of which was located a few miles away in Santa Flores where I worked. Another was here in Bonita, a city that adjoined Santa Flores, where I was starting my Monday morning. Like most of Southern California, the two cities melted into each other, indistinguishable except for lines drawn on a map.
The Bonita branch was located in a strip mall that housed an insurance office, a hair salon, a gift shop, a deli, and four empty store fronts. I stopped by as needed to pick up real estate appraisal reports on my way into the office that I called home for eight-plus hours a day, down on Fifth Street.
I could have gone straight into the insurance office where the appraiser, an old guy named Jerry Donavan, rented a tiny space, but I was acquainted with everyone who worked in Mid-America’s Bonita branch, and it would be rude not stop in and say hello.
Besides, I could get a coffee there and it was a good reason to keep from going to my own branch.
I swung into the alley behind the Bonita branch on State Street, parked, and got out. A little early morning sunlight seeped through the overcast November sky, giving the air a crisp autumn feel—or at least the closest we here in Southern California got to it—making it perfect weather for the pants, blouse and blazer I had on.
Employees of the Bonita branch groused about the location of their office—which had been selected by a guy in our home office in Chicago using a Google images search, apparently. In yet another flash of corporate brilliance, the strip mall on State Street, a major artery in the area, had been selected because of its signage and accessibility. Nobody bothered to look at the rear of the property, however.
The employee parking lot was small, separated from the rear of the building by a narrow alley that ran the length of the strip mall. The one security light offered little illumination, and the two Dumpsters drew scavengers and the homeless. A tall block wall covered with graffiti separated the parking lot from an apartment complex known for drug activity.
Leave it to Corporate.
The rear door to the Mid-America office was propped open a few inches, so I walked inside. With drug dealers in the area and questionable people roaming the alley, you’d think they’d keep the door locked.
I guess the branch manager thought that if employees faced a locked door in the morning, they might turn around and go back home.
Maybe he had a point.
The rear entrance led into the office’s stock room which was filled with shelves of supplies and boxes of old documents; the restroom and a breakroom were off to the left. The door that led into the office stood open. The corporate decorator had played it fast and loose, painting the walls off-white, throwing down beige carpet, and selecting neutral colored desks and chairs.
Gloria Colton, the branch assistant manager, poked her head out of the breakroom.
“Oh. Dana. It’s just you,” she mumbled, then disappeared again.
Gloria had to be in her late thirties but already looked as if she were losing the battle against aging. Short, round everywhere, with hair that resembled a bale of hay and skin similar in texture to an American Tourister carry-on, she looked as if she’d attempted every beauty treatment known to womankind, and each and every one had failed.
Gloria was a bit of a failure herself, from the rumors I’d heard. She’d been with Mid-America for over ten years and had been repeatedly passed over for promotion to branch manager. She’d transferred to branch after branch all over Southern California and, somehow, she’d landed here at the Bonita office a few months ago.
I tried to like her, but the best I could do was tolerate her.
Gloria walked out of the breakroom with a steaming cup, passed me, and went into the office without speaking.
“I’ll just have a quick cup of coffee,” I called, to show her what good manners sounded like.
She didn’t bother to look back.
It was much too early in the day to get annoyed, I decided. Besides, the coffee smelled great.
I stepped into the breakroom, a tiny place barely big enough for the table and four chairs, the mini-fridge, and the counter with a sink and microwave. It had the same look and smell of every other breakroom I’d been in. Coffee cup rings on the counter, cups and spoons that never seemed clean but were used anyway.
I found a mug in the cupboard and was reaching for the pot when I heard the roar of a car engine, followed by screaming.
I ran to the back door. Across the parking lot standing next to her car was Janine Ferris, the office’s asset manager, screaming hysterically.
On the ground in the center of the alley lay an odd bundle of something. A few second passed before I realized it was a man.
“Call 9-1-1! Somebody got hit by a car in the alley!” I shouted to Gloria, and sprinted outside.
I rushed to the man lying on the pavement. Blood poured from what was left of his skull. I knew I couldn’t do anything to help him.
I turned away and looked up and down the alley in both directions. No sign of the car that had hit him. Nobody had stopped, pulled over, gotten out. Whoever had done this had kept going.
Janine continued screaming. She’d gone white, yet her cheeks were flushed, her eyes wide with horror.
I jogged across the alley.
“Janine? Janine!” I said.
She kept shrieking.
My people skills aren’t the best, and all I could think to do was to grab her shoulders and give her a little shake.
“Why! Oh, my God! Why would anybody do that!” She screamed the words in my face. “Oh, my God! Poor Jerry!”
“Jerry?”
I whipped back to the body in the alley. Bits of broken glass shimmered in the sunlight. A stack of blood soaked papers fluttered in the breeze. I tilted my head left, then right. The height and gray hair, the gut hanging over the belt looked familiar.
“Oh, my God,” I mumbled. “Jerry.”
Jerry Donavan, the appraiser I’d come here to meet.
I guess his mojo wasn’t working at all this morning.
“Why! Oh, my God! Why would somebody do that!” Janine shrieked. “Deliberately run him over!”
I looked up and down the alley again. It flashed in my head that whoever had hit Jerry might have gone into some sort of shock, which was understandable, but would grasp reality in a minute or so, turn around and come back. But there was no sign of a car returning to the scene.
“Oh, my God!” Janine screamed. “How could somebody do that! Just run over somebody! Why would anybody want to kill him?”
Obviously, Janine didn’t know Jerry Donavan as well as I did because I wondered just the opposite.
Why wouldn’t somebody want to kill him?
Chapter 2
I got Janine, still screaming hysterically, into the breakroom. Gloria wandered in, poured a cup of coffee, and drank it herself.
“Janine, you have to calm down,” I said, as loud as I could without screaming myself.
That only escalated her wailing. Incredibly, I heard sirens over her shrieks and made a move for the door, but Gloria beat me to it, leaving me stranded with screaming Janine.
Granted, my people skills are often lacking. I knew I couldn’t leave her alone in her condition. But my ears had started to ring and she was getting on my nerves big-time. Just as I was seriously considering slapping her across the face—I’d always wanted to do that to someone—she clammed up.
Nick Travis walked into the breakroom.
He had that effect on a lot of women. Including me.
Nick was a homicide detective. He and I had history stretching back to high school here in Santa Flores when he was dating my best friend Katie Jo Miller and something ugly—really ugly—happened between them.
Nick seemed to think he and I had a future together, but we didn’t. He refused to come clean about what happened back in high school, and I couldn’t get past it.
Nick had been pursuing me for a while now, making his intentions obvious. He wants me. I know he does.
But I was standing on principle. Not always easy where handsome, tall, broad-shouldered, dark haired, blue-eyed Nick Travis was concerned.
Thankfully, for once, Nick’s good looks had worked in my favor. He’d snapped Janine out of her screaming fit with his mere presence.
“Let’s sit down,” Nick said, gesturing to the little table in the center of the breakroom.
His voice had a soothing effect, a lure nearly impossible to ignore. Like a Stepford wife, Janine moved to one of the chairs and sat down. I caught myself just in time and remained standing.
Outside, I could hear the voices of the police officers, techs, and everybody else who’d arrived on the scene and were going about their official duties. I was glad I wasn’t out there—and not just because Nick was in here.
He stepped closer to me and frowned. “What are you doing here?”
“I came by to pick up some appraisal reports—”
I pressed my lips together. Was it a good idea to tell a homicide detective—even one who lusted after me—that I’d come to the office for the sole purpose of talking to the guy who’d ended up dead?
This seemed like a good time to change the direction of the conversation.
I gestured to Janine and told Nick her name.
“She’s the asset manager here,” I added. “She saw it happen.”
Nick kept frowning at me.
“I come by all the time,” I said.
Nick turned up the amperage on his frown.
“It’s not unusual,” I said, and could hear my voice shake a little.
Nick had a way of getting me rattled. If he frowned at me for another few seconds, I just might confess to running down Jerry myself.
A few more grueling seconds dragged by and Nick finally took a seat across the table from Janine. He pulled a little notebook from his inside jacket pocket, introduced himself, and gave her his handkerchief.
I didn’t know Janine all that well. I’d spoken with her over the phone occasionally and visited here in her office when I’d come to pick up appraisals. Her car had broken down a few weeks ago and I’d given her a ride to work for several days.
I put her age in the mid-twenties range. She was shorter than me—most women are, since I’m five-nine—and had short dark hair. If she hadn’t just witnessed a man getting run over by a car and been plummeted into the depth of hysteria, I’d say she was a little frumpy. But in view of the circumstances, I’ll be generous and call her curvy.
“Can you tell me what happened?” Nick asked. “Did you see anything unusual when you pulled in?”
Janine wiped her nose and gulped a few times. “Well, Dana was here. I saw her car.”
Nick threw me another frown, then turned back to Janine.
She gulped and another wave of tears washed down her cheeks.
“The next thing I saw was Jerry coming out of the back door of the insurance office,” Janine said. “He was bringing the appraisals to our office. He always does that when he knows Dana’s coming by to pick them up.”
Nick threw another frown at me.
“Then a car just came out of nowhere,” she said and sniffed hard. “And it hit him.”
“Did you recognize the car?” Nick asked.
“It was like Dana’s car,” she said.
Nick hit me with a frown that morphed into something darker.
“I didn’t see who was driving!” Janine suddenly sat straight up in her chair. “I swear, I don’t know who it was! I have no idea!”
“What the hell is going on here?” came a voice from the doorway.
Eric Hunter, the branch manager, strode into the breakroom scowling at everyone. Nick got to his feet and introduced himself.
A lot of women thought Eric Hunter was good looking. I was one of them. There was a smooth, sophisticated ease about him. He’d just turned thirty. I knew this because I’d attended an after-work birthday celebration for him at a nearby restaurant last week. Eric had light brown hair, blue eyes, and a wife, whom I’d met at the birthday celebration, who was both beautiful and had exquisite taste in men’s clothing, judging from how well Eric always dressed.
He’d taken over the helm of the Bonita branch about six months ago, even though he was young for the job. But he’d proved his worth. Almost immediately the branch had skyrocketed to the enviable position of top profit producer in our division. Every month his branch posted incredible gains. Eric Hunter was the golden boy of Mid-America Financial Services, and he made it look easy.
But he didn’t look so smooth at the moment. Right now, he looked mad.
“I just got here,” Eric said, nodding toward the rear parking lot. “The place is crawling with cops and nobody will tell me a damn thing.”
“A man was struck by a hit-and-run driver,” Nick told him. “Jerry Donavan.”
“Donavan?” Eric reeled back, and for an instant I thought he was too stunned to speak. He proved me wrong. “Donavan? Damnit!”
“I don’t know who did it!” Janine wailed. “I didn’t see anything!”
Eric paced a few steps across the breakroom mumbling a string of curses, then swung around. He popped open the button on his suit coat and planted his hands on his hips, glaring down at Janine. Her sobs ratcheted up, growing higher and louder. Soon, only dogs would
be able to hear her.
Or so I hoped.
“I’ll get one of the paramedics,” Nick said.
No way was I going to be stranded in this tiny room with screaming Janine any longer.
“I’ll do it,” I shouted, and broke for the door.
Nick, obviously thinking the same, nearly wedged himself in the doorway with me but we both made it through. I glanced back into the breakroom. Eric continued to glare at Janine.
He looked like he wanted to slap her too.
I lost my nerve at the back door and let Nick go outside to get one of the paramedics. I didn’t want to look at Jerry again, or what was left of him.
At the front of the office Gloria stood with the branch’s only other employee, Misty. I hadn’t seen Misty come into the office but that was probably because I was busy with Janine.
Misty’s job at Mid-America was that of cashier. She took payments from walk-in customers, handled the bank deposits, prepared loan documents, and took care of other general office duties. She was a recent hire, nineteen years old—and unable to drink at Eric’s birthday celebration—a high school graduate who’d opted for work over college. Her clothing and hair style screamed senior year.
So there I stood faced with three options: go outside where a dead body waited; return to screaming Janine in the breakroom; or make small talk with two people I didn’t really know or particularly like.
I really had a fourth option, but what does it say about life when the most appealing thing to choose from was to go to work?
I glanced around. No one was watching me. No one had said I couldn’t leave. So I left.
I darted in and out of the breakroom before Eric could saddle me with Janine, snatched my handbag off of the counter, and made my escape.
Using my superhero-like powers of focus and concentration, I kept my gaze on the pavement in front of me and made it to my car without looking at the cops huddled at the crime scene. I drove away without a backwards look.
***
I pulled my Honda into the lot beside Mid-America’s branch on Fifth Street, the place I called home for forty-plus hours each week. The office was located in downtown Santa Flores on the ground floor of a two-story building. Just down the block were the post office, the courthouse, and all sorts of restaurants, bars, and office buildings.
Fatal Luck Page 1
